


Wings Of An Angel

by grimtart



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Character Death, Death, Destiel - Freeform, Dying Castiel, Gen, Hurt Castiel, Protective Dean Winchester, Sad Dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-27
Updated: 2014-08-27
Packaged: 2018-02-15 00:10:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2208294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grimtart/pseuds/grimtart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Castiel were to die in Dean's arms...the wings leaving scars on the hunter's chest...though he begged and begged the angel to not leave him, not yet...<br/>Just a little fic I wrote because of Tumblr.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wings Of An Angel

There was a soft silence for a little while, Dean just sitting on the sidewalk on this unbelievably busy night. His back was against the ruined brick building, and his breath was unsteady, although it marginally began to maintain itself, unlike his heartbeat, which paced hurriedly in his chest. He was glad that what had happened was over, at least for now. But he didn't exactly have much time if the job wasn't done yet. Though, the older Winchester rested his head back, closing his eyes and sighing, hoping that nothing would come up on Sam’s or Castiel’s sides.

Though, almost immediately, his phone began to ring, not much to his surprise but more to his frustration.

He picked his head up in a groggy hurry, and scrambled to his feet. Realizing that it was Sam that was calling him, he opened the phone up and answered. "Yeah,” he said, sighing and scrubbing at his forehead with the heel of his free hand.

"I don't know _what's_ happening," Sam warned, sounds interfering with his audio a bit and throwing the other end a bit of feedback, due to the wind blowing past the speaker of his phone (Dean decided that he must have been running, now), "but you gotta head to Cas, right now."

"What happened?"

"Trust me. You're gonna want to."

Dean hesitated, a scared lump forming in his throat. The older Winchester tried to swallow it down, a small pang of agony slicing at his head as he did so, finding the entire process a failure. "Sam, what's happeni-"

"Dean, I don't have time to explain. Just do it!"

Dean had tried to say something in response, but before he could, the line went dead. He knew that his brother hadn't been joking around, and there was no time to waste it seemed. Worry paralyzed him for just a moment, his limbs frozen, terrified thoughts about Castiel shuffling through his mind and forcing him to stay in one stop. Oh, damn it, what had he gotten into?

There was no hesitation once he reigned control over himself; Dean shoved his phone into his front pocket and began running, as fast as he could, to the place where Castiel had been apparently fighting for the Winchesters. The site was too close to him to even waste time hopping into the Impala, and so instead he made his way there on his feet, the weight of them pounding against the cement and vibrating up through both of his legs as he continued sprinting. And in these few moments of urgency, of sparking-up hopelessness in his attempts to reach Castiel in time, Dean almost cursed under his breath at himself for allowing the Angel to do something like this for him, for his own damn sake.

Finally, all the way down the long road that had seemed to be over an eternity long, near the house they were keeping guard on, Dean stopped running. "Cas!" he called loudly, his lower lip quivering just slightly. He looked all around, the wreckage the only thing in sight thus far. If the Winchester had supposed himself terrified before, he was most definitely a million times more than that now, the scenery itself already blown to bits. The ground had been uplifted in some areas, and in others it was still anything but touched.

After minutes that acted as if they were hours, or even days, Dean turned his head to see a hand raised up slightly in the air. It was visibly bloodstained, even from such a distance, and he could already tell that it was no good.

"I'm over here," replied Castiel’s voice, the tone strong yet so very weak all the same.

Dean ran over to where the hand was raised, and confirmed that it was, indeed, Cas, who was sitting there with his legs crossed. His imitated poise made him look like he was just fine, but Dean saw that something was seriously wrong. The Angel’s eyes were almost dilated, their usually bright blue fading into something of a daytime skyish color, something glazed over more so than usual. His wings, too, were visible, and this must have meant there had been a lot of trouble. Dean hadn’t ever seen them in their entire history together, and as of now they looked to be as fragile as they could ever be, ruffled and bloody black feathers hanging every which way.

The hunter fell down to his knees next to Castiel, bright jade eyes widening in a doe-like fashion at the concerning sight. There was a deep, narrow wound, which ran down from his collarbones to the bottom of his stomach, blood pouring out of his vessel in heavy amounts (the crimson downfall was even more plentiful whenever he took a breath). His very own Angel blade was dug deep inside of the cut, just at the bottom of it, still stabbed into him deeply, though it looked like he had tried to resist it or pull it out beforehand. The blood of his vessel continued to extract from the safety of it, from between his pale lips as well now. The redness of it had been smeared across his hands, staining the once clean skin and leaving trickles in curved gaps between his shaky fingers.

"Oh, Christ, Cas," said Dean, his voice trembling and threatening to cave in. He ripped the blade out of the Angel’s body and threw it far off to the side, as if the silver was scorching his flesh at the very touch of it. "Dude." He placed his right hand on Castiel's chest, right where the slit was. His face twisted up in a type of painful grimace, the other hand scrambling to cover up the bottom part of the cut, succeeding nothing and only getting blood on his own hands. “Hey, buddy, you’re gonna be okay. You’re gonna be fine, just hold on. It’s just a little cut.”

"Dean, calm down," Castiel ordered in a low tone, his voice shaking in pain. He didn’t want things to get even worse than they already were, he didn’t want the agony to sharpen itself. And Dean panicking? That was sending _him_ into his own fit of anxiety, heart racing as his lungs frantically discarded and renewed air over and over again, kind of choking a couple of times through the blood that demanded to spill from the small pools on the insides of his cheeks. It had been Angels, other Angels, that attacked him, and he was still trying to grasp the meaning of it (during his weakest point, at that). But, no matter the reason, he was set on the task of keeping them from the Winchesters, and convinced that there was no other way than this.

In a hurried fashion, Dean took his hands away from his friend, unsure of what to do now. Since Castiel had been stabbed with an Angel Blade...There wasn’t much that could be done, to be honest. His Grace was probably running strong, perhaps too strong, and it wasn't going to be a good turnout. Though, Dean refused to believe it, shimmying the brown leather jacket off of his shoulders and grasping the right sleeve in his hand. He folded it once, bringing the smooth fabric gently down against the wound, frantically attempting to soak up the blood. Of course, Dean knew that it was doing absolutely nothing, as it was up to Castiel’s weakening grace now, but it was calming him to think that he was helping him somehow. "You're gonna be okay Cas, don't you worry,” he assured, unassertiveness plaguing his voice as he made eye contact with the other.

Castiel weakly narrowed his those blue eyes of his into Dean’s, not rejecting the fact that his blood was being dabbed at, but simply grimacing through the sting that shot through his entire torso, flinging itself through the rest of his body somehow as well. He let it happen, though, as he knew what Dean was trying to do, and he didn’t want to be the one to ruin the moment even more. Instead of telling the hunter to calm down once again, Castiel swallowed down the blood that swam in his mouth, soon after saying, "I thought I could do this, Dean."

"You shoulda waited for me, Cas, because you _couldn’t_ do this on your own.”

“I…” Castiel shook his head a little bit, his voice trailing off as he broke eye contact with the hunter. That was enough of that. He had told himself the same exact thing a million times over, and maybe more. Somehow, he knew that the outcome would turn out like this. Him laying there, bloody, half-gazed and weak, Dean having to watch against his wonderful will…It broke the Angel up inside, and so he finally inched backwards, as a sign for Dean to stop pointlessly stroking his chest with the cloth. His back became hunched as he just stared at the ground, his hands moving to fold against his lap. The blood that the Winchester had been working at was only getting streaked, anyway, and not soaked up; it was _leather_ that he was using, after all.  Cas frowned a bit, his eyes growing heavy and threatening to close on him. He had almost given in...Almost slipped away…

No.

No, _no_ , Castiel was not giving up now. He was _not_ going to leave when things were getting hard, he had done that too many times before. And he tried to convince himself of that, but everything else was pointing him otherwise. Everything was making him believe that these moments were his very last. So now, inspecting Dean now, from the horrified glimmer in his eyes to the quiver running through his body, the Angel’s lower lip had to be rolled inwards and his teeth had to clamp down against it to keep it from trembling too much.

Leaning towards Castiel, Dean began to feel a bit uneasy. He saw the look on his significant friend's face, and he knew that it wasn't a good one. It wasn’t confident, it wasn’t one of resistance, or prolonged desire to keep on trying. This made Dean almost physically sick, his stomach churning heavily before he finally realized what was happening.

He knew that Cas was going to die. That he _accepted_ it.

There was a pause, the air seeming to grow thick around the two as soon as Dean got the message. "No way," the older Winchester demanded, shaking his head in protest and trying to ease his lips from making as much movement as they were. "No way in _hell_ am I gonna let you do yourself in now. You're stronger than this!" His eyes began to sting, so he rubbed at them with the pads of his middle and index fingers, bringing them back down to see the same broken Castiel through his blurred vision. He blinked a couple of times, repairing that with absolutely no problem.

Parting his lips to speak, Castiel made eye contact with Dean for a short time, interrupting his upcoming words with a soft cough. He felt the hacking coughs flooding upwards, but before he could release any, he twisted his body so that he was facing away from Dean, so that he didn't have to see the licks of blood shooting out from between his lips. He pressed his hands against the ground he was turned to for support, but ended up having to crawl up onto his knees, doubling over now in oppose to simply leaning. He had little strength left as it was, so this caused a worry in Dean's features. The hunter began to reach for him, to help him up so he could get help somewhere, but Castiel said, "Don't touch me, Dean. Please." He swallowed, coughing just a small bit before turning back to his friend, a clear film forming over the surface of his eyes. One of his hands fell down against his other side as to support him upright, though Dean had to sling a quick hand over to steady him. Once as content as he could get in his agony, he managed, "We’ve had good times, Dean, right?"

Dean had to take a moment to process those words, all of his memories of them over their years together all drawing in at once, causing the painful sting to return to his eyes. "Don't you dare, Cas," he warned. His lips tightened, his eyes attempting to squint back the tears that were rimming his lower eyelids. Unsuccessful, he continued, "Don't you _dare_ start that lecture that everyone gives when they're dying. You're not dying, you hear me? You're gonna be perfect, buddy, you’ll be a-okay."

"Dean,” Castiel started, only consenting the other’s statement with an extremely faltered chuckle, “you became someone profoundly dear to me. Sam, too, but... _You_." He made a weak smile, and even though it faded almost as quickly as it had shown up, it was genuine, and that was all that mattered at that point. The smile was covered in his own blood, however, so it hadn’t exactly been a very welcoming one to begin with. “It’s always been you to try and save me.”

"Cas, please,” Dean pleaded, resorting to such now in order to find a way to save the Angel. “What can I do to help you get better, man? Sing you some Amazing Grace? C’mon, give me ideas.”

"You can’t do anything, just..."

"I’m not just gonna let you die. See, you and me, we’re friends, and that means that I’m not leaving you to die.”

“There isn’t any point in trying, Dean.” Castiel’s voice had warped from a gentle tone to one that was harsh and chilled, trying to make the Winchester see that he couldn’t be saved. Finally letting his lips quiver as much as they pleased, he struggled to bring his wings forward, staring at one and then the other in nervousness, the feathers matted with thick blood and falling freely from the base. The Angel had to pause for a couple of seconds to catch his breath, blue eyes fogged and almost borderline tearful at this point. "My Grace,” he continued, barely above a whisper. “It’s very slow, and being stabbed with that blade should have killed me already. My wings, and...I’m...I’m sorry, Dean. I’ve failed you, again." Castiel's frown indented further, and he avoided Dean’s gaze as he tried standing up. He was successful, with a groan and a loud yelp of excruciating pain, though he stumbled as he began to walk away. Away from Dean, away from this place in general. To be honest, he didn’t want to be around Dean when he passed on. It wasn’t going to be pleasant, and him being there to watch it all go down would make it an infinity worse.

Dean stood up as well, his concern widening along with his eyes when the sound had echoed from Castiel through their surroundings.  "Cas!" he shouted, watching as the Angel tried to make a quick getaway. Dean had been reaching for his phone when Castiel was about to fall over, but, forgetting about the phone and the call that he was about to make, he ran to him and extended both arms, catching the Angel before he had the chance to hit the ground. “I gotcha,” he informed gently, arms locked around Castiel’s as he brought him _slowly_ to the ground, against Cas’s will of course. The Angel’s wings were pressed against Dean’s chest, and the smaller was squirming in order to make an escape (though that was to no avail).

"Dean, you have to let go of me," Castiel pleaded desperately, trying to get away from the hunter’s tight grasp. He knew what would happen if his wings stayed pressed against Dean's bare chest like this when he died, and he did not want those events to occur. He didn’t _want_ Dean to have that constant reminder of him, he didn’t want him to think about the loss. "Please, Dean. I’m begging you to let go of me. You've got to."

Refusing to let go of Castiel, though he tried his hardest to escape, Dean fought the tears that swam around in his eyes, the ones that had been asking for release. "You’re not leaving here without me, and I’m not leaving without you. We gotta call Sam."

"Dean, listen to me, please--"

" _No_ , Cas!" He realized how weak Castiel was at this point, and he almost believed that he was hurting him further by holding him like he was. But he still held on for dear life, and there was never a moment where he felt discouraged enough to let go of him. He wanted to save him so badly...So badly, that it almost seemed possible. "Hang in there, Sam will come lookin’ for us. This'll all be over soon, Cas, just...just hold on a little longer."

Castiel hung his head down, his lower lip twitching in a type of ashamed regret. He had let Dean down by getting so hurt, by being so _foolish_ , and now he was causing Dean to over-think everything. He was sure that this was not going to end well for his closest friend, not now. He had stopped struggling by this point...and he had stopped moving altogether, in fact, now simply sitting there, locked in his place by Dean. The time spent there was focused upon his actions and how he could have survived for Dean, how he could have done things better.

This silence made Dean scared, scared to Hell and back. The hunter was hesitant, but he let go of his angelic friend after several uninterrupted minutes of quietness, and after that period of time, Castiel didn't make a movement, wings and almost unclothed back still against Dean. “Cas?” Dean asked, untangling his arms from the other’s. He shook his shoulders marginally, his lips curling down into a frown. “Cas, listen to me. Show me two with your fingers if you can hear me. Cas? Cas.”

The next couple of moments...They were almost too hazy for Dean to make out. All he remembered was the bright light...That bright, white light. The hellish, agonized scream that Castiel had released. The way that his entire body arched as his wings’ feathers began to tremble and burn off a searing heat against Dean’s chest, forcing the hunter himself to cry out and take his hands off of Cas.

Then, everything was suddenly...back to normal. Though, Castiel’s vessel had no wings, and the feathers of them were floating gently above them, swinging upwards to what seemed to be the Heavens. Dean shifted Castiel so that he was laying on his back, cold and damp soil sinking around his discolored skin. The hunter looked down at himself, noticing from his partway unbuttoned shirt that there was a black mark visible on the skin of either side of his torso. He brought both of his shaky hands to the rest of the buttons, ripping the fabric from the tiny units and pulling each piece to the side.

Castiel’s wings had been scorched onto his body.  

The sight took Dean’s breath away, but he couldn’t be concerned about it now. He had Castiel’s wellbeing to be fretting about. "Cas!" he repeated in a worry which had no limits. He moved to kneel beside him now, trembling without end, hands sliding down to rest gently against each side of the Angel’s head. Taking the time to check if he was breathing, if he was getting cold, Dean’s body was beginning to malfunction, the panic taking him over almost completely. The pleading to come had fear and sadness written inside of the pitches, the unwanted beginnings of a few tears taking place. "Breathe, Cas!” he urged through his teeth. “Come on! Don't do this to me now, please." He stared straight into those wide open eyes, which had gone dim, fading very much since the last time they had been dancing freely. This was it. This was the part that Dean hadn’t seen coming, that he thought would _never_ come. He couldn’t handle it, not like this. "Cas, don’t make me count to three. Blink, smile, cough, do somethin’! Come on, Cas! _Cas_!"

Dean had waited long enough by now, leaning down and resting his forehead against Castiel's. "Please don't leave, Cas," he whispered in a raspy tone, his stomach twisting up and making him feel like he was going to vomit. Honestly, he almost wanted to do that anyway. "Please. I'm so sick of losing people that I care about. _Please_. Cas, man, it’s okay. I gotcha, okay, you nerdy angel? I gotcha.”

And there they stayed, the dead Angel and the wing-scarred hunter.

The two with profound bond that would have no end.

 

 


End file.
